Ask HN: Historical examples of when housing prices become too high?

1 pointJTon1 comment

I keep reading about how expensive it is to buy a home in Silicon Valley, NYC, London, Toronto, etc...

I want to know if there is any historical context to when housing prices become unaffordable to the middle class. what happens? Do young people shift en mass to renting? Does the "bubble" eventually bust or do home prices stay stagnant? etc

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In SV, there's a huge range of prices depending on neighborhood. There are many cheap neighborhoods close to tech companies. Mostly, what you pay the big bucks for is living in neighborhoods with other rich people, and sending your kids to school with their kids. In the cheaper neighborhoods, many of your neighbors will be blue-collar.

Real-estate agents will of course extoll the benefits of living in a neighborhood with people who make more than you, since they get 7% of what they can convince you to spend. Obviously, lots of people consider living in an affluent neighborhood worth paying for. But you can live a nice life in a cheap neighborhood too.

You have to consult your values to decide what's important to you.

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